Authority over the $1.25 billion in federal rebuilding funds that remains in the development corporation's coffers would be shared by the city and the state under the plan, the officials said.

In Greensburg, the prognosis is unclear, said Denise Unruh, executive director of the South Central Community Foundation, a local organization that has already established a rebuilding fund for the town.

The city told the outside world that it would provide a generous rebuilding fund - and actively discouraged money-raising efforts that had begun all across the country.

But both Mr. Silverstein and the Port Authority of New York and New Jersey are required to replenish the rebuilding fund when the insurance case is resolved.

It took the Bush administration nearly six months to request the necessary rebuilding funds.

The U.S. Congress was threatening to withhold post-World War II rebuilding funds unless the Bell Act was ratified.

The local paper here has produced a book to commemorate the tornado with all profits going towards to the rebuilding fund.

The benches are likewise carved with names of those who made substantial contributions to the original rebuilding fund or, subsequently, to the life of the chapel over the twentieth century.

It was not until 1822 when £55,000 had accrued in the rebuilding fund that efforts started.

One thing the Bush administration should have done immediately after Hurricane Katrina was to waive the requirement that state and local governments match federal rebuilding funds.